James Thomas Rook Jr.

You are welcome, I have found so much stuff the last 6 months is mind blowing.... 😆😆😆

http://web.archive.org/web/19990129063340/http://www.dhcommhr.coe.fr/eng/28626CP.E.html
Press communiqué issued by the Secretary
to the European Commission of Human Rights
Application No. 28626/95
Khristiansko Sdruzhenie "Svideteli na Iehova"
(Christian Association Jehovah's Witnesses)
v.
Bulgaria
Quote:
As regards the alleged involvement of children the applicant association submits that children cannot become members of the association but only participate, together with their parents, in the religious activities of the community. In respect of the refusal of blood transfusion, the applicant association submits that there are no religious sanctions for a Jehovah's Witness who chooses to accept blood transfusion and that, therefore, the fact that the religious doctrine of Jehovah's Witnesses is against blood transfusion cannot amount to a threat to "public health".

.... the problem with that is you have to have them with you.
Hmmmmmm.

Church ‘shuns‘ 15-year-old, then father – ends up in court
Posted by SDD Contributor on November 9, 2019 at 4:20 am  
The Supreme Court of Canada heard arguments Thursday in a lawsuit against a religious congregation’s “shunning” practice, but the congregation and several other groups contend the justices had no right to even take part in the case.
Randy Wall, a real estate agent, filed the suit against the Highwood congregation of the Jehovah’s Witnesses organization in Calgary, Alberta.
Wall was expelled from the congregation for getting drunk and not be properly repentant, court records said. He pursued an appeals process through the Jehovah’s Witnesses then went to court because he said the Witnesses’ “shunning” — the practice of not associating with him in any way — hurt his business.
He explained his two occasions of drunkenness related to “the previous expulsion by the congregation of his 15-year-old daughter.”
A lower court opinion said: “Even though the daughter was a dependent child living at home, it was a mandatory church edict that the entire family shun aspects of their relationship with her. The respondent said the edicts of the church pressured the family to evict their daughter from the family home. This led to … much distress in the family.”
The “distress” eventually resulted in his drunkenness, Wall said.
 
Wall submitted to the court arguments that about half his client base, members of various Jehovah’s Witnesses congregations, then refused to conduct business with him. He alleged the “disfellowship had an economic impact on the respondent.”
During high court arguments Thursday, the congregation asked the justices to rule that religious congregations are immune to such claims in the judicial system.
The lower courts had ruled that the courts could play a role in determining whether or not such circumstances rise to the level of violating civil rights or injuring a “disfellowshipped” party.
The rulings from the Court of Queen’s Bench and the Alberta Court of Appeals said Wall’s case was subject to secular court jurisdiction.
A multitude of religious and political organizations joined with the congregation in arguing that Canada’s courts should not be involved.
The Justice Center for Constitutional Freedoms said in a filing: “The wish or desire of one person to associate with an unwilling person (or an unwilling group) is not a legal right of any kind. For a court, or the government, to support such a ‘right’ violates the right of self-determination of the unwilling parties.”
Previous case law has confirmed the right of religious or private voluntary groups to govern themselves and dictate who can be a member.
But previously rulings also reveal there is room for the court system to intervene when the question centers on property or civil rights.
The Association for Reformed Political Action described the case as having “profound implications for the separation of church and state.”
It contends the court should keep its hands off the argument.
“Secular judges have no authority and no expertise to review a church membership decision,” said a statement from Andre Schutten, a spokesman for the group. “Church discipline is a spiritual matter falling within spiritual jurisdiction, not a legal matter falling within the courts’ civil jurisdiction. The courts should not interfere.”
John Sikkema, staff lawyer for ARPA, said: “The issue in this appeal is jurisdiction. A state actor, including a court, must never go beyond its jurisdiction. The Supreme Court must consider what kind of authority the courts can or cannot legitimately claim. We argue that the civil government and churches each have limited and distinct spheres of authority. This basic distinction between civil and spiritual jurisdiction is a source of freedom and religious pluralism and a guard against civic totalism.”
He continued: “Should the judiciary have the authority to decide who gets to become or remain a church member? Does the judiciary have the authority to decide who does or does not get to participate in the sacraments? Church discipline is a spiritual matter falling within spiritual jurisdiction, not a legal matter falling within the courts’ civil jurisdiction. The courts should not interfere. Here we need separation of church and state.”
The Alberta Court of Appeal, however, suggested the case was about more than ecclesiastical rules.
“Because Jehovah’s Witnesses shun disfellowshipped members, his wife, other children and other Jehovah’s Witnesses were compelled to shun him,” that lower court decision said. “The respondent asked the appeal committee to consider the mental and emotional distress he and his family were under as a result of his duaghter’s disfellowship.”
The church committee concluded he was “not sufficiently repentant.”
The ruling said “the only basis for establishing jurisdiction over a decision of the church is when the complaint involves property and civil rights,” and that is what Wall alleged.
“Accordingly, a court has jurisdiction to review the decision of a religious organization when a breach of the rules of natural justice is alleged.”
 
               

Norway is the great catalyst that will force the GB to start thinking about basic human rights, as currently there is a lot of discussion in the Norwegian Government about " ... Why are we giving the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society Norwegian dollars (Kroners) every year from Tax money for their charities ... for EACH and every of the approximately 112,000 JWs in Norway (paraphrased), when they prohibit their members to vote"... which THEY consider to be an inalienable, and non-negotiable human right of all peoples, everywhere.
The WTB&TS is currently being governed by the Lawyers, Accountants, and the Finances department, with the GB not admitting being personally responsible for ANYTHING.
What we consider "reasonable", they consider EXTREMIST, and many European nations give tax money to ALL legitimate churches, without restriction on how they spend it.
By violating what these governments' and peoples' basic understanding on what constitutes extremism, soon, if not already, it is going to affect the flow of cash into the Society's Treasury.
One of several major concerns of the Governing Body is to not hemorrhage money, as it has been doing for years in the constant Child Sexual Abuse court cases.
THIS is what will drive any change .... not love ... not justice ...not fairness .... MONEY!
By the way .... has the Society recently decided that voting is a matter of personal conscience?
What I have read is so "weasel worded", I cannot tell.
 
 

Norway is the great catalyst that will force the GB to start thinking about basic human rights, as currently there is a lot of discussion in the Norwegian Government about " ... Why are we giving the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society Norwegian dollars (Kroners) every year from Tax money for their charities ... for EACH and every of the approximately 112,000 JWs in Norway (paraphrased), when they prohibit their members to vote"... which THEY consider to be an inalienable, and non-negotiable human right of all peoples, everywhere.
The WTB&TS is currently being governed by the Lawyers, Accountants, and the Finances department, with the GB not admitting being personally responsible for ANYTHING.
What we consider "reasonable", they consider EXTREMIST, and many European nations give tax money to ALL legitimate churches, without restriction on how they spend it.
By violating what these governments' and peoples' basic understanding on what constitutes extremism, soon, if not already, it is going to affect the flow of cash into the Society's Treasury.
One of several major concerns of the Governing Body is to not hemorrhage money, as it has been doing for years in the constant Child Sexual Abuse court cases.
THIS is what will drive any change .... not love ... not justice ...not fairness .... MONEY!
By the way .... has the Society recently decided that voting is a matter of personal conscience?
What I have read is so "weasel worded", I cannot tell.
 
 

Don't know if it's related, but I heard of a lawsuit or two where a Hall and property were just recently remodeled and spiffed up to be worth, 3 million, for example, but the Society was so anxious to cover financial expenses that they forced a quick sale for only one million, and now the congregations are separated to various Halls, not-so-nearby. A brother was removed because he wanted to raise this into a financial issue. But there might also be a kind of problem showing up that some get too attached to the properties that they have helped to find and fund. (Like a rich person that donates a lot for a church, or buys a pew to get his name on it.)
As you say, I'm not sure that each of these cases has been handled with proper communication. Also, I'm not sure the term 'financial benefit' is fully appropriate either. In some cases the impression was 'financial necessity.' I heard talk of financial instruments (bank loans) that would have been embarrassing not to be able to meet. The Catholic church is not afraid to announce that they have had a diocese here and there on the verge of bankruptcy, which is sometimes really no more than loan restructuring. But I don't think anyone is ready for terms like this to be used about us, yet I believe that there was a real concern about one such loan. If it becomes public elsewhere, I will post some of the information I base this idea on. If not, consider it just unsubstantiated rumor. Not worth repeating.

Lol, no, just realistic 😀
I've learned in life, that most decisions, no matter how noble or spiritual they appear, revolve around sex or money or both. Now call me cynical, lol.

Well, aren't you the cynical one?

Well that is what I had in mind. I agree, we are not ready to have terms like this applied to us. That is why I think that kind of situation is "glossed over" with other terms, such as "Jehovah is guiding this" and "it's for our spiritual benefit to cooperate".
On the other hand, to be fair, I bumped into a couple of single sisters from said KH and they seemed to be pretty happy in their new one. But who knows what the reason is....new hunting grounds perhaps? 😀

That was intended. Also I believe the autism spectrum is very useful in helping to understand autism in its various forms. Math is also all the rage in schools today, but it doesn't mean we should reject it.
For those already suffering, it is much more practical to deal with symptoms. In the long run, yes, it is much more useful and revealing to put the emphasis on causes.
You might notice that I was just brainstorming about the various "levels" of benign and malignant apostasy so that we would think about the ways we judge others. I think it's revealing, and not necessarily in a bad way, that two persons can spout the same apostate views about the Bible or the Watchtower Society, and only one of them gets disfellowshipped. The other still says the same things but he will often get full association with his Witness family and relatives. I think it shows the desire to have a form of natural affection, which by definition is "natural." (2 Timothy 3:3). I think some of us are here are good Witnesses without many qualms at all about association (online at least) with those who have clearly apostasized.
On the "spectrum," so to speak, I actually spoke a lot about causes, and very little about the symptoms. Of course, I wasn't too specific about either, as I was just trying to come up with some sample categories to show just how the types can be all over the place, and sometimes our own treatment of persons, and the Society's treatment too, is necessarily inconsistent. 
And one of the points is that we have a personal responsibility to watch out for our spirituality, and can't just follow what others tell us to do in every case. Imagine the possibilities if some Witnesses showed a lot more love to persons in the @Witness household, who were not DF'd, and how this might result in a good Witness (no pun intended). Or imagine the possibilities if some Witnesses decided to associate with persons in the @Witness household without any concern to their own spirituality, and became "infected" with thought that resulted in doubt and a lack of faith. The point is that we are sometimes on our own, and must always be careful about anyone and anything that we associate with. Jesus associated with tax collectors, but we are also given a Biblical responsibility to treat some in the congregation as tax collectors, even some who might be called a brother.
Hard to say. Personally I think there is room for some individual conscience in a lot of areas that are currently matters of "legalism." This does not mean that anyone can expect to depend completely on their own conscience without appropriate counsel when it seems to affect their spirituality. But the GB have given a lot of thought to human rights, and have made a lot of progress in many nations of the world to defend right to assembly, right to our own religious practices, right to preach from door to door, right to "demand" blood alternatives, right to be seen as ministers, or as a legal religion.
To our long-term benefit, GB members have acknowledged human rights more and more in interviews about child abuse, child endangerment, education, corporal punishment (especially seen before judges in custody cases, presentations before the ARC, questions fielded by the "PR"/correspondence departments, etc). In a practical way, some of the practice hasn't caught up with the "human rights" rhetoric yet.

After you have done all these things, say, “We are good-for-nothing doormats. What we have done is what we ought to have done.”
I love the (actual) expression. When you do as you should, you don’t go strutting around with chest puffed out. You downplay your own role. It is somewhat like the verse used in last week’s Watchtower study: 
“by God’s undeserved kindness I am what I am. And his undeserved kindness to me was not in vain, but I labored more than all of them; yet it was not I, but the undeserved kindness of God that is with me.” (1 Corinthians 15:10) 
It is the same, really, as Jesus’s saying. The gift is not his, but God’s. Still, he will not waste it, but will put it to good use. Afterwards he will say, “I am a good-for-nothing slave. What I have done is only what I ought to have done.”
It is hyperbole. The Master doesn’t really consider us “good-for-nothing.” Jesus used hyperbole all the time. It was one of the tools in his teaching toolbox. It has the added advantage that those of common sense and humility instantly get the point, and those without those fine qualities do not—they are more inclined to harp on the Lord thinking his people “good-for-nothing” and how that violates their human rights.
Sometimes I even think Trump’s tweets, with their numerous spelling errors, may—probably inadvertently, be taking a page from this playbook. Maybe they are just his form of “hyperbole.” When he tweets that North Korea has launched all its nuclear missels, people of common sense will run for the hills. People without that quality will run to their keyboards to point out that the idiot can’t even spell the word right.

The ONLY environment I know of where it would be smart NOT to factor this in is religion, where apparently contributed money NEVER stops flowing in, like a Japanese Tsunami.
Double negatives make my head hurt!

It appears that Kingdom Halls, like old people, and radioactive materials, have a "half life".
I am 73, so statistically, half of people my age will be dead in 10 years. At 83, half of those people will be dead in ten years.
Then it speeds up.
At the end, I hope to read about it on the Internet .... BECAUSE ... I read FOXNEWS, and not CNN.

... this is why an ice skater pulls her arms in closer to her body ..so that she will spin faster.

You cannot economically justify having a baby ... but willy-nilly ... people DO have babies.
Some things are more important than economic justification.

Perhaps he was just tired of having her incessant screaming, smearing poop on the walls, chasing him arount' the house with a machete, poisoning his food, and microwaving the cat.

.... the problem with that is you have to have them with you.
Hmmmmmm.

I have heavily invested in  a lesser precious metal... lead.
Oh wait ... I prepared for the Zombie Apocalypse..

.... the problem with that is you have to have them with you.
Hmmmmmm.

I will guess how many ex Bethel workers who lost their jobs after WT Society accepted a new economic and financial audit of operations within the corporation, ask for and received Letters of Recommendations. No matter of jobs they had in Bethel, from cleaning and washing to IT skills, those letters possibly helped some of them when looking for secular jobs.
I know one Bethel elder who left Bethel and because he has fine knowledge about computers, he open private business and now living from that. His wife also found secular job.
One sister who left Bethel as cleaner, have not easy time to found and keep cleaning work at secular job market.
Some other Bethel people lost place in Home, and went to pioneer service or looking for jobs.
I do not know what official credentials, diploma they have. But that depend on what secular school education they have had accomplished before Bethel. Only, as i learned by @JW Insider respond, Gilead School students received formal piece of paper as proof of finished education inside WT Society. All other, Bethel workers, can get Recommendation Letter. But I am not sure for  what secular jobs, Gilead School students, can/would candidate for in real word.
Funny thing i see in Recommendation Letter and Gilead Diploma. According to Bible verses in 2 Cor 3, JW rejecting such Letters and Diplomas as proof for their qualification about service, ministry (in teaching others about Gospel, using Bible as whole for teaching others) This including two things: 1) "spiritual" qualification for teaching , and 2) "spiritual" qualification for position in hierarchy (clergy style).  
On other side it is good if you have some paper as proof of your qualification .... for something. Or as proof how you have skills and experience in cleaning floors. Little irony,  you won't mind me .:))
I am working in one High School. For several years we have White Boards and board markers in almost all classes. Few smart boards, too.  Only in one room,  teacher (older generation) want to stay on white chalk and green board. Ministry of education, working on school reform  (new curriculum)  and equip schools with technological equipment.
In the same time teachers and professors in Grammar (children from 7-15 of age) and High school (from 15 - 18 of age) system, are in strike for better material position, salary. It is hard to find professor for IT subject to teach children, because they can find jobs with much better salary than in school.   

I do not consider myself a god, or a sheep.
I consider myself a "Sheepdog", whose NATURAL instincts and "function in life" is to protect women, and children, and my family, and all innocent people, and if necessary, to engage in mortal combat with others who try to harm them.
...this even makes the sheep VERY nervous, but the reason many of them are sheep is not a desire to be peaceable with all men, as far as it depends upon them ... but because they are naturally stupid, and or cowards.
Andre: I have no idea what your last two posts mean in the real world.
Fine ideas from Scripture, but irrelevant to this post.
If I have missed something, please explain it to me in short words, short sentences, and short paragraphs, .... in your own words.
Otherwise, it is just "white noise". ... like a fan running while one is sleeping.
 

No new light, just the elder's opinion, and not a very good one at that. It still stands that Jehovah will be the judge as he knows the reasons and circumstance.

Ask your elders about the list of decisions at the last  Annual Meeting.  Don't think anything about suicide was in that list.
 

Thank you, i have read this already, but it isn't very recent.. My main point was to find out if the Governing Body / Writing Dept' has very recently written anything new regarding suicide. In the last 6 month maybe ? 
My personal feelings are that God, through Jesus Christ, will resurrect all those that they find worthy. And that 'worthiness' cannot be judged by any human. Thanks again.

I don't know .... it changes so much I get a headache trying to keep up with "light" that is profoundly explained with hundreds of thousands of words, and a potload of scriptures, that backed it up ... all which turned out to be wrong!
I don't like headaches.